The White House recently announced that U.S. President Biden has decided to postpone his visit to Germany and Angola, scheduled for mid-October, to deal with the hurricane. The visit to Angola did not materialize due to various reasons, including the promise made by President Biden during his visit to Africa over a year ago. President Biden has less than three months left in his term. With the U.S. presidential election race in full swing, there are big variables in whether President Biden will visit Africa.
The United States has made many promises to Africa, but many have not been fulfilled. In a situation where the game between great powers is intensifying and the global structure is being greatly adjusted, I looked back on how well the United States is fulfilling its promise to support Africa’s development.
Over the past half century or so, along with changes in the world situation, the United States’ attitude toward Africa has gone through a process of giving importance, neglect, and re-importance.
In order to compete for hegemony with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, the United States increased economic support to Africa from the mid-1950s. However, with the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the development of African countries, the importance of Africa to the United States decreased. During the Clinton administration, as Africa’s political and economic influence grew and the United States adjusted its global strategy, Washington reexamined and established its relationship with Africa, increased resource investment in Africa, and positioned it as a ‘new type of partnership’. Since then, the U.S. government, from the George, Walker, and Bush administrations to the Biden administration, has attempted to strengthen cooperation between the U.S. and Africa by issuing different versions of claims and bills for Africa.
Among them, the one signed by former U.S. President Clinton in May 2000 is the most representative. The bill increased market openness to Africa and the scope of benefits from the low-rate tariff quota system, increased the types of African products entering the U.S. market without tariffs from 1,800 to 6,000, and increased the number of African textile products, mining products, and agricultural products that the U.S. imports from Africa. tariffs were reduced. Afterwards, the United States launched a series of amendments targeting AGOA and further increased market openness to Afri. Currently, about 30 African countries enjoy preferential policies.
However, because of the large gap in economic capabilities and development levels between the United States and Africa, the bill allowed the United States to benefit more than Africa.
American politicians are talking more about the ‘Rubito Corridor’, a new project for Africa, than the AGOA bill, which has been implemented for over 20 years. The Rubito Corridor is in Angola, where President Biden was scheduled to visit. Angola is located in southern Africa, next to the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and is a major oil producer in Africa, rich in mineral resources. At the summit of the seven major countries in May 2023, the United States, together with its allies, announced plans to build the ‘Rubito Corridor’ for the first time. The ‘Rubito Corridor’ plan is a project to divide and connect the railway networks of Angola, Congo, and Zambia into two parts, main and branch lines, and is mostly a project to renovate existing old railways. The US president called this portico ‘the largest railway investment in African history.’
However, from a realistic perspective, the ‘Rubito Corridor’ railway almost entirely overlaps with the Benguela Railway reconstruction project, which was commissioned and built by a Chinese company from 2006 to 2014 and began operation in February 2015.
The United States is attempting to present the ‘Rubito Corridor’ as if European and American countries are contributing to the construction of infrastructure in Africa, but this is not entirely true. The core structure has already been created by China. China is the biggest contributor in name and reality. On the official site of the ‘Rubito Corridor’, it is written, ‘If China had not invested billions of dollars to rebuild the Benguela Island and confirm the Rubito Port, the ‘Rubito Corridor’ would not have had the scale it has today.’
The United States claims to be the world’s largest foreign aid donor and provides a lot of aid to Africa. At the US-Africa Summit in December 2022, the US promised to invest $55 billion in the ‘African Union 2063 Agenda’. However, this investment is not fully provided to Africa. All expenses for U.S. related organizations, experts, and scholars to conduct research in Africa and stay at luxury hotels, as well as expenses for various U.S. foundations to conduct activities in Africa, are all paid from these funds. In addition, various types of training and seminars, NGO expenses, and even support for anti-government factions are provided from these funds.
Of the $55 billion that the United States promised to provide to the African Union 2063 Agenda, only $15 billion is for newly concluded projects, and the remaining $40 billion is for repackaging the creativity and consultations that the United States has presented on Africa in recent years. It will. Political intentions are greater than economic goals.
Whether it is aid that appears to be a large amount of money or investment that seems plausible, many believe that it is a political show by the United States to maximize its own interests, and that it is trying to maintain its influence in Africa through hegemony and tyranny under the guise of ‘investment’ and ‘aid’. It’s just an attempt.
